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Sunday, June 29, 2014

This is just a short sharing on using the water tap for drinking that I found out recently.

Although many developed countries can drink water directly from water tap, not many of us aware that it is not advisable to take the hot water directly from it. I used to it is okay but not really. It is better that you boil the water if you want the hot water! :)

I found this statement from New South Wales (NSW) Health website and it goes like this:

Use water taken straight from the cold water tap for
drinking and cooking. Hot water systems generally
contain more dissolved minerals and metals, due to
the heating process.

However, I read in the forum and some people say these minerals and metals are too little that can be neglected. Maybe they are right but I guess this also depends on your body whether you can detox them effectively in long run? I"m not sure, can we detox lead? I leave it to you. :)

Another tip is when water has not been used for sometimes, it is is better to flush it for few minutes before drinking. This is because of water that has been standing in pipe for long time can dissolves metals (e.g. copper and lead) which are bad for health.

Thursday, June 12, 2014

Since I have moved to Australia, some of my friends ask me which agent to use and is the good one? I highly recommend this "Global Migration" agent that I used and you can visit their website here. Many of my friends who have already migrated use this agent too and they're very happy with their services.

On the other hand, be aware of not making assumption that all migration agents are professional because I have another friend has to change to another agent and all his money spend previously is not refundable.

Having said so, I have another type of friends who against going through agent. You can read and write, why do you still need to pay an agent to help you fill up the application form? This is ridiculous. It is true in certain extend but let me just share my experience here and you can make your own choice.

Why Agent?

Everything has an opportunity cost, the agent cost is about 50% of your total migration process cost. The total cost for me is around RM 20K, so the agent fee takes up to RM 10K. So the real question is should you pay RM 10K fee to the agent?

Note: By the way, the cost now should be higher already due to inflation.

Good - Save Your Time on Research

The whole process can be quite complicated if you're not familiar with it. It also depends on whether you have enough points or not, the minimum points that you're eligible to apply. Assuming your points is in the border and requires state sponsorship (for example in my case), having an agent to help you is crucial.

This is because it is not easy to understand which state sponsorship you can apply (need to read a lot of documents to figure that out). If you make an mistake, the back and forth communication takes time which eventually may cause you miss the window of lodging your Visa application because every occupation has it's quota. Once the quota is reached, you will have to wait for another year.

Bad - Need to Spend RM10K

As mentioned above, ultimately this depends on whether you have enough points or whether you want to spend time on researching the whole migration process by yourself. Of course also if money is a concern, it is better you don't go for an agent.

Please note that also there is an optimum age (e.g. between 33 and 36, just an example but please check the point system) to give you the highest points. If your age has not reached 33 (just an example) and you don't need to rush. You can slowly take your time and you don't need t waste this agent fee. If you miss this year due to some mistakes that you make, you can still try it out next year which is also easier for you because you will have higher points by then.

Some Notes about Global Migration

Even though you have an agent, you cannot trust the agent 100%. I think it depends on who is assigned to you. Basically they assign a single point of contact for each of their clients. For me, I don't think the one I got is experience enough to handle me (maybe I asked too tough questions?) because I can clearly tell the difference when I spoke to another worker.

One not so good experience that I had with them was they applied an unnecessary skill assessment for my spouse which caused us to waste few thousands ringgits and what really made me pissed off at that time was they didn't want to admit their mistake. What they did is to refund the agent fee to me for the skill assessment but not the fee that we paid for doing the skill assessment. Well, I guess this is still better than nothing.

Despite this bad experience that I had with them (don't get me wrong), I am still very thankful that they helped me a lot throughout this migration process. Without their services, I could not have gotten my Australia PR that soon.

Final Notes

Overall, I do highly recommend "Global Migration" if you're looking for an agent for Australia and New Zealand migration in Malaysia.

One thing I like about them is the money back guarantee but please note that the money back guarantee is "ONLY" for agent's fee. This means whatever fees that you pay to Australia/New Zealand government is not refundable. However according to them, their success rate so far to help their clients to get the Visa is 100%! I guess this also means they pick their clients to maintain this 100% achievement. So I was the lucky got picked!

Good luck! Let me know if you have any questions, I have gone through this and I hope I can help.